


putting the damage on

by abvj



Category: Suits (TV)
Genre: F/M, Post 2x08
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-26
Updated: 2012-08-26
Packaged: 2017-11-12 22:40:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/496437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abvj/pseuds/abvj
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>These are the types of things they do for each other. </i> Set immediately post 2x08.</p>
            </blockquote>





	putting the damage on

Donna is the champion of reaching for her phone blindly in the middle of the night, picking up on the first ring despite the hour or time zone of even the day of the week. It is a habit that started when Harvey was still in the DA’s office, when he was young and hungry, but also just Harvey, just a guy trying to make a name for himself whilst expecting her to be unyielding and work just as hard in an effort to get him to the top. Even in the beginning they were a team, a unified front, and the habit has followed her since. Donna is a light sleeper now because of it, phone always on and the volume always on high in the middle of night as she skirts the line between consciousness and sleep when there is a deadline or merger or big trial to be fought and won. Harvey doesn’t bother with manners and calls whenever he damn well feels like it or needs something, and she doesn’t mind, really, because somewhere along the line his priorities became her priorities. 

Donna also likes to win _almost_ as much as Harvey does.

(Now that she doesn’t work at Pearson-Hardman, it is an exercise in will just to turn her phone off once she crawls into bed at night. She had thought that no longer being employed by a self-centered, egotistical, cocky, and all too-competent lawyer would equate to a better sleep schedule, less money spent on expensive coffee blends and cucumbers and face cream to hide the dark and glaring circles under her eyes. 

She was wrong. Some habits are harder to break than others. Donna knows this all too well.) 

Harvey is a gamble though. At work he has – _had_ – Donna to screen his calls for him. Outside of work, he does it himself while operating under a hierarchy that changes with each passing day. For example, Jessica’s calls are always answered on the first ring, Louis usually goes straight to voicemail, Mike’s calls are fielded depending on the day, the case, and how much he had tried Harvey’s patience earlier that afternoon. Harvey never wants to appear too earnest, too eager, too available, and he usually doesn’t answer the phone unless he knows who is calling, what they want, and the answers to the questions they are bound to ask. 

Tonight, he picks up on the third ring, just before the call would click over to voicemail, and Donna can picture him clearly – sitting on the train, thumb paused over _ignore_ as her face flashes up at him, the alcohol humming under his skin, the grief bitter and unyielding as it presses into his shoulders. The sound of ringing in her ear is replaced with silence crackling over the line, and she had foolishly believed it – _this_ – would be easier once she bridged the distance. Donna thought once she made the effort of allowing him back into her life, even if it was in a small way such as this, the hurt would lessen on both their ends. 

They were always better together, as a team, than they were separate. An indestructible force. 

Donna wonders when they both lost sight of that. 

The sound of his breathing is the only thing that greets her and she counts his breaths one by one, notes the weight, the slight, barely decipherable hitch that lessens before fading almost completely. Her fingers loosen and tighten simultaneously around the tumbler in her hands. The guilt lingers in the back of her throat, but the disappointment burns and nips at raw nerves and open wounds.

She betrayed his trust. Donna knows this and will never try to deny it even if her intentions were pure, even if she is unashamed of how her first instinct was and always will be to protect him. But he didn’t fight for her, and to Donna that makes them even. 

That is a fight meant for tomorrow, not today, so Donna takes a long, slow sip of her drink to wash it all down, to center herself. Curls her feet underneath her and reaches to mute _The Shawshank Redemption_ as it plays out on the screen of her TV. 

Still, Harvey says nothing. 

“Train almost back?” she finally asks softly, her words breaking the silence, and bridging the gap between them. It’s nearly nine, and she’ll always know Harvey better than anyone and despite whatever may come between them. Besides, Donna has been through this day with him four years running. It’s why she called, why she swallowed her pride and dialed his number after a day of trying to actively forget, of willing herself not to. 

“Yeah,” is all he says. 

Harvey sighs and it gives too much away – how tired he is, how much this day wears him down, how much it will always affect him. Donna closes her eyes against the sound of it, brings the glass to her lips and takes another slow sip. It burns and she welcomes the bite of the alcohol as it slides down her throat. 

She had gone to the funeral with him. Sat beside him during the service, stood beside him with her spine ramrod straight and her tears silent as they watched his father’s casket get lowered into the earth. Donna’s fingers lingered near the crook of his arm the entire day, the single touch her offer of strength and support even though he never asked for it. He hadn’t needed to. Donna just knew and offered it without reservation because those are the things they do for one another. At work she fielded phone calls. At the service and after, she intercepted relatives and ran interference with his brother while Harvey spent hours buried in his father’s study, hiding from a world that no longer included his father. In the city, in the courtroom, Harvey is the best goddamn closer one could ever see, but when surrounded by his own family he felt like the smallest person alive without his father’s presence next to him. Donna finds this fact, this information only she is privy to, one of the most utterly beautiful and humane things about him. 

It was only after – when Harvey was across town and back at the office, dealing with things the only way he knew how – that she allowed herself to mourn the loss of a man she had loved and respected. Donna had known Gordon almost as long as she had known his son, had shared too many drinks and dinners and memories with the man to consider him anything less than a friend. But his death was Harvey’s burden, his own cross to bear, and Donna had known better than to try and deprive him of it. 

This morning, Donna’s second thought of the day after waking was of the man she missed some days as if he were her own father. After yoga, she smiled thinly behind her sunglasses at the judgmental cashier when she stopped by the closest liquor store to pick up a bottle of bourbon. Not because it was Gordon’s favorite, not even because she liked it, but because it was he and his son who taught her how to drink it like a man one holiday when the city was snowed in and she couldn’t make it upstate. They took her in, made her privy to the details of their own traditions, made her feel welcomed and loved. 

Everybody pays their respects in their own way. This is hers. 

“You remember when we went to that ball game?” she asks quietly. Her glass is nearly empty and she swirls the remaining liquid around while she talks. “And your father got us kicked out when he got into an argument with a Sox fan because the jerk wouldn’t agree that the designated hitter brings asymmetry to an otherwise perfect game?” 

Harvey almost laughs. “It was a flawless argument and he would have won if he hadn’t punched the guy in the face. It took me weeks to clean up that mess.” 

“It was worth it.” Donna smiles at the fondness in his voice. “That guy was an asshole.” 

There is silence again and it stretches her too thin, threatens to unhinge her. She doesn’t know how to do this with him, how to not be _them_ , but she tries not to think about that at all. 

When he speaks again, his voice is low and resigned. Donna hates that more than the distance between them, and she does not think about the look on his face when Louis asked the only question neither one of them had the answer to. She does not think about him waiting for her by the elevators, silent, pressing the button to the elevator for her as she held a cardboard box that contained the summation of her entire career between her steady hands. She does not think of how he didn’t fight for her, how he just let her go, and how much that single act of betrayal cut straight to the bone. 

(Donna also doesn’t think about this: Another night spent on this very couch. His sigh somewhere near her ear instead of over the line, his weight pressing into her, and her thighs opening wider to accommodate him as his mouth moved hungrily and deliberately against her own. 

Bourbon had coated her lips that night too.) 

“Look, Donna –” he starts, his voice so serious, and she knows what he is going to say, can already hear the words, and she’s not ready to hear them. She doesn’t want to talk about it, about this, about any of it. Not tonight. Tomorrow they’ll go back to their trial separation, but tonight she’s calling a truce, a momentary ceasefire. 

This is just one of the many things they do for one another. 

“I just wanted…” She pauses, clears her throat. “I wanted to make sure you were okay.” Donna says pointedly, effectively cutting him off mid-sentence. Her fingers tighten around the glass in her hand and on the TV Red and Andy are reunited on the beach of Zihuatanejo with the sand between their toes and the ocean blue and endless serving as their backdrop. Her throat burns. She swallows around it. 

Harvey sighs again and Donna presses her eyes closed, pictures him sitting in his window seat, the ankle of his left foot resting atop his knee, his cheek between his teeth as he considers his response carefully. 

“I’m okay,” he says, finally, and she knows he’s forcing a smile, needlessly establishing the picture of perfection even though she isn’t there to serve as a witness. Donna has always seen right through it, but she appreciates the effort. It’s who he is. 

“Okay.” 

There is silence, then: “Are you okay?” 

Donna’s mouth curls. “Yeah, Harvey,” she murmurs. “I’m okay.” 

“ _Okay._ ”

The phone call ends as quietly as it started. One of them says _talk soon_ or something similar, never _goodbye_ – even now – and the line goes completely silent thereafter. The quiet of her apartment hums and pops in her ears, sets her on edge, and she turns the volume on the TV up again to fill it. Harvey will head to the office, not home. She glances at the clock, figures he took the last train back into the city, and he will be in his office within the next hour. It’s too weird and hurts a little too much for her to be here and not there waiting for him with coffee, files, and a vinyl record picked out that his father would appreciate. 

_The things they do for one another_ , she thinks, pressing her mouth into a thin line as she reaches for the bottle of bourbon to refill her glass.


End file.
